Bangladesh Law Commission chairman ABM Khairul Haque said the commission is making a draft of an act named ‘Food Security Act-2016’ to make sure that food security of the people is ensured.
The commission chairman made the remark as chief guest of a discussion at Chittagong Press Club auditorium on Wednesday afternoon.
BLC and ActionAid Bangladesh jointly organised the discussion.
Khairul Haque said the government took several schemes to distribute foods among the citizens and that the main purpose of the law would be bringing the schemes under a legal structure.
‘It is the constitutional right of the people to have foods. The government is constitutionally committed to people to ensure their food security. Although the government has come a long way, still they could not ensure it fully,’ said Khairul Haque.
‘Food sufficiency does not necessarily mean food security. It is also possible to ensure food security without having food sufficiency. The government is trying to ensure food security. We are trying to bring the government initiatives under a legal framework by having the law,’ the law commission chairman and also the former chief justice, said.
He said the priority of the law would be children, their mother and people of crisis-hit areas. He said the draft would be submitted to the government who he hoped would pass it into law.
Chaired by journalist and poet Abul Momen, Bangladesh Law Commission member Justice ATM Fazle Kabir, ActionAid country director Farah Kabir, Chittagong University of Engineering and Technology professor Asiful Haque, Chittagong University associate professor Manzurul Kibria spoke at the discussion.